Madam, - Please, please, could the media in the coming "exam season" exercise restraint and forgo the hype with which in the last few years they have surrounded the Leaving Cert.
In recent years we have had on a daily basis, on news bulletins and in the newspapers, a surfeit of publicity which serves no useful purpose.
We are kept informed about which subjects are being examined each day, and after every exam eager journalists ask pupils for their (purely subjective) opinions on whether the exam was "easy" or "hard" or "fair".
Is it any wonder that we hear of high levels of stress among pupils and parents?
The equivalent of the Leaving Cert takes place in other countries without the media obsession which we experience here.
This year, please give us all, especially the students and their parents, a break. - Yours, etc,
ED HAUGHEY, Muff, Co Donegal.